Andy Pettitte got knocked around by the Astros last night, allowing seven runs while failing to make it out of the fifth inning, and Wallace Matthews of ESPN New York writes that the Yankees left-hander wasn’t even sure who was doing the damage:

What made it worse was that Pettitte couldn’t even name the hitters who were jumping all over him in the Yankees’ 9-1 loss to the team with the worst record in the American League.

“I threw a pretty good cutter to the No. 2 hitter, and then after that it just kind of abandoned me,” Pettitte said. The Astros’ No. 2 hitter is named Brandon Barnes, and he enjoyed a career night, with three hits (two doubles) and three RBIs.

“Later, I had a kid 0-2 and I was trying to keep it at [3-0] and tried to go back to the cutter,” he said. It was the same “kid,” Barnes, and the same result, a two-run double that made it 5-0.

Pettitte said afterward that the whole outing “made me sick to my stomach.”

Not quite true: Bill Brown, the TV play-by-play guy is still with the team, but I’ve heard that he may not be traveling to all the away games. I wouldn’t know: we are shut out from watching the ‘Stros on TV this year because of the ComCast deal. Sometimes it’s a blessing not being able to see them this year, though.

Alan Ashby is back as a radio color analyst — he was there during Pettitte’s time in Houston. Rex Jones, the assistant athletic trainer, is still there. I get their point and they may be relaying what Pettitte told them, but the information is wrong. Pettitte must have “misremebered” like his buddy.

Organizations turn over all the time. He hasn’t pitched for the Astros since ’06. Nice narrative, but not an unusual one.

Maybe not knowing who was in the lineup he was pitching against had something to do with the shelling Andy took last night. I know they’re not a good team but they’re still major leaguers. Fans can have an excuse for not knowing who Brandon Barnes is but not millionaire pitchers who have 4 days to prepare for their next start.

I have seen college teams in spring training embarrass major league teams because there was no scouting report and pitchers were just working on specifc things like mechanics. This is the first time I recall it happening in the regular season though. So yeah read the scouting report or make your catcher do it at least.

The Astros finally realized the formula to beat the NYY, play no-name players, especially pitchers. I don’t know if the Yankees have the worst scouts in baseball, but it seems every time teams throw a no-name starter against them, the NYY are just clueless. At least the first time around.